Lawmakers decry Trump's immigration halt for 19 countries: 'scapegoating entire nationalities'
Source: The Guardian
Wed 3 Dec 2025 17.08 EST
Last modified on Wed 3 Dec 2025 17.09 EST
Immigration groups and lawmakers are sharply criticizing Donald Trump’s latest move to halt immigration applications from 19 countries already under US travel restrictions, a decision that comes amid reports that naturalization ceremonies for people on the travel ban list are also being canceled. On Tuesday the US Citizenship and Immigration Services posted a policy memo that announced an immediate “adjudicative hold” on all asylum applications “regardless of the alien’s country of nationality”, as well as a review of individuals from “high-risk countries” who entered the US following Joe Biden’s inauguration in 2021.
The 19 countries include Afghanistan, Burma, Burundi, Chad, Cuba, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Laos, Libya, Republic of the Congo, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Togo, Turkmenistan, Venezuela, and Yemen – all of which have either partial or full travel restrictions. The latest immigration crackdown follows last week’s shooting of two national guard members in Washington DC, one of whom died. The alleged assailant, Rahmanullah Lakanwal – a 29-year-old Afghan national who entered the US in September 2021 after the US’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan – was granted asylum by the Trump administration earlier this year.
In Tuesday’s memo, the USCIS stated: “Recently, the United States has seen what a lack of screening, vetting, and prioritizing expedient adjudications can do to the American people … In light of identified concerns and the threat to the American people, USCIS has determined that a comprehensive re-review, potential interview, and re-interview of all aliens from high-risk countries of concern who entered the United States on or after January 20, 2021 is necessary.”
Critics have condemned what they have described as an attempt by the White House to “scapegoat” migrant communities. In a statement to the Guardian, Human Rights Watch’s US director Tanya Greene said: “Nothing meaningfully links these 19 countries except the administration’s opportunistic stigmatization and exclusion of people based on where they were born.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/03/trump-immigration-ban
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I can't believe you never heard of Chad. I recall they had some beautiful stamps. 
